Research

My research is broadly concerned with the culture of everyday life. My particular interests at the moment cluster around cultural feelings, domestic life and post-war British art, architecture and design. My latest book is called The Art of Brutalism: Rescuing Hope from Catastrophe in 1950s Britain and was published by Yale University Press in 2017. From Septermber 2014 to September 2017 I was a Leverhulme major research fellow working on 'Habitat and the Making of Taste 1964-2011', and preparing a book (provisionally titled The Making of Taste: Habitat, Lifestyle and Class in Postwar Britain) for Manchester University Press.

I am interested in supervising PhD research in the fields of cultural theory and cultural studies generally and have a particular interest in postwar cultural history. I am also keen to supervise innovative projects on cultural feelings, design culture, material culture, and visual art.

I have previously supervised PhDs in the areas of pop music, rhythmanalysis, ethnography, film, art history, and design history.